


Transforming Water

by unadrift



Series: SGA Season Five Tags [5]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Angst, Episode Related, Gen, Team
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-28
Updated: 2009-11-28
Packaged: 2017-10-03 22:29:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,397
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22933
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unadrift/pseuds/unadrift
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They haven't discussed it beforehand, but when it's late and almost all of Atlantis is asleep, they meet at 'their' table on the balcony.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Transforming Water

**Author's Note:**

> Tag for _Ghost in the Machine_. Beta'd by tacittype.

They haven't discussed it beforehand, but when it's late and almost all of Atlantis is asleep, they meet at 'their' table on the balcony.

John is the first to sink down into a chair next to Rodney, cup of coffee in hand. He doesn't bother asking the obvious, 'Couldn't sleep?' so Rodney doesn't have to think of a pathetic lie, for which he's grateful.

"You're not eating," John observes and takes a sip of coffee.

Rodney gestures at his tray, which is filled with the far too healthy stuff they usually leave out for the night shift. "Help yourself. I'm just not hungry enough to cope with _this_."

"Thanks. Bananas are good," John informs him and takes one.

On any other given day random _Doctor Who_ wisdom would have gotten at least an eyeroll out of Rodney, which would have prompted John to grin in return.

On any other given day.

"Good evening," Teyla greets and sits down opposite to Rodney. He doesn't think he will ever see a time when Teyla is anything but polite.

She's got Ronon in tow. "Hey," he says, foregoing his usual noncommittal grunt, and flops down gracelessly next to her. Rodney thinks he must be in a talkative mood.

"Here," Rodney says and shoves his tray at them.

"You're sharing?" Ronon eyes the fruit sceptically.

"It's not poisoned or anything, for god's sake," Rodney huffs.

Maybe, just maybe, Rodney isn't sure, Teyla elbows Ronon in the side then. "Thank you," she says and picks up an apple.

John starts peeling the banana. Teyla's apple is held by the stem and then efficiently twisted around until the stem rips off. Ronon keeps watching the tray, especially the kiwi, as if it's likely to attack any second.

"Kiwi's aren't predators," John says eventually, then tilts his head. "The fruit at least. Don't know about the bird."

"Uh-huh," Ronon says and starts a pre-emptive strike with a knife that appears from out of nowhere.

"Do you think Elizabeth is aware of her situation?" Rodney asks, because he needs to ask, and because no one else will.

"Rodney--" John starts.

"I mean, when Replicators are frozen, in space, are they _dead_? Is it like a stasis, like they're in a coma, or are they fully awake and can't do anything but float around? Just-- float?"

John exchanges a glance with Teyla then. They think Rodney doesn't notice, they always do. But Rodney notices every time. Except maybe when he doesn't, because he wouldn't really know about it then, would he?

"Imagine floating through space," he goes on, voice rising, "for-- for all eternity and _being aware of every second of it._ Imagine--"

"No," John says firmly. "Stop it, Rodney."

"But--"

"No."

"But-- Elizabeth. It was-- is-- was _Elizabeth_!"

"Still not convinced of that," Ronon says, and pops a piece of kiwi into his mouth. "Part of her might've been in there. But it wasn't _her_."

Rodney stares at him. He really _is_ in a talkative mood.

"Rodney," Teyla says carefully, "you cannot blame yourself for what happened to Elizabeth."

"We've had this discussion before." John's tone is the 'I'm trying to be a responsible leader here, so don't make it any harder than it already is' one, the one Rodney knows all too well. "I thought that we'd agreed that it wasn't your fault. That you did what you thought was right at the time. That there were-- developments you couldn't have foreseen."

Rodney has never made things easy for John before. He isn't going to start now. "I went against your orders. You specifically ordered me not to-- but I did it anyway. Your instincts were right. You have great instincts. I should have trusted your--"

"For the sake of the argument," John interrupts him, "what would have happened if you'd listened to me?"

"Elizabeth--" Rodney swallows, "she would have died. A real-- a human death. With dignity." She should have. Rodney had given her a semi-life that had ended in her semi-death, a terrible in-between state, a soul trapped inside a _machine_.

"Without Elizabeth's help we would not have been able to steal a ZPM from the Replicator homeworld," Teyla states matter-of-factly. "We would have been forced to abandon the city. Atlantis would have burned in the atmosphere of a nameless planet. People would have died. And the survivors would have been trapped."

"No matter which way you turn it, Rodney," John says, "something good came out of this."

"That's easy for us to say," Rodney snaps. "We're alive. Of course we're fine with the situation! I doubt Elizabeth would agree."

"She would," Ronon says.

"Really." Rodney crosses his arms. He can't believe the lack of compassion on display here. "Who made _you_ answerman, anyway?"

Teyla leans forward and speaks intently, "The Elizabeth we knew wouldn't have it any other way."

Rodney gives a bitter laugh. "Of course she would! She even _said so_!" And hadn't that been a great revelation, that Elizabeth considered her being alive a grave mistake – Rodney's grave mistake – and that she expected him to _kill her_ at the first sign of the slightest trouble.

"That was before she saved Atlantis," John points out. "She died to save Atlantis then. And whoever this-- entity was, she-- it did the same."

"We wouldn't have needed saving the second time if I hadn't--"

"No, we wouldn't, because we would have been _dead_," John stresses, pointing the half-peeled banana at Rodney. "Do we need to start this conversation again from the top?"

Rodney sighs. There is no point in starting this conversation again from the top. They won't see his point, and he can't accept theirs.

"We know this," Ronon speaks into the heavy silence, "Elizabeth died for Atlantis."

Teyla nods solemnly. "She was a good leader, a beloved friend, and will be terribly missed for a long time to come."

John sits silently for a moment, his eyes wandering from Ronon to Teyla and back a few times, then he clears his throat. "We can agree on that, can't we?" he asks, turning to Rodney.

Rodney swallows and nods, because he doesn't trust his voice not to break.

He can't remember ever crying for Elizabeth. At first she'd just been-- gone, and when the message of her death reached Atlantis, it seemed unreal, distant, like hearing about some person in a parallel universe.

Now, irrevocably, every last bit of her is gone.

Whether dead, or afloat in space, frozen or frozen in time, it doesn't matter.

Elizabeth is gone.

"We need--" John says and clears his throat again. He gets up and vanishes into the mess.

They don't talk until John comes back with four glasses and a bottle of water. "Champagne would be more appropriate." John sits and pours them each a glass.

Teyla picks up her glass. "It is really the thought that counts."

John raises his glass. "To Elizabeth." He hesitates, but there really is nothing left to say.

Rodney lifts his glass to clink it together with the others'.

Ronon downs the water like it's the most alcoholic beverage known to mankind. Or Satedans. Whatever.

Teyla sips slowly, eyes turned inward.

John is looking at Rodney, waiting.

Rodney raises the glass to his lips. The water is pleasantly cold, and Rodney can almost feel fine pearls of carbon dioxide tickle his tongue, along with the distinctive taste of alcohol. He suspects he's smiling a little when he sets the glass down on the table, empty.

"You know, I think I want to--" John says thoughtfully. He stands and picks up his glass. At the railing he weighs it in his hand, and then, with all the force he seems to be able to gather, John throws it over the edge of the balcony, far, far into the ocean.

It seems like a really good idea. _Goodbye,_ Rodney thinks when he pulls back to gather momentum, then he throws.

If Ronon or Teyla find this ritual odd, they don't show it. Rodney thinks he can hear Ronon's glass shatter on a tower that is entirely too far away for this to be possible. Teyla manages to even _throw things_ solemnly.

Afterwards the four of them are standing at the railing, looking out to the ocean.

When the clouds open to reveal the smallest of the five moons, Rodney hears Teyla whisper, "Farewell."

This is really it.

Farewell.

Goodbye.


End file.
